Spiced date cookies

Soft and crumbly, studded with succulent dates and flavoured with warming spices. These spiced date cookies are a childhood favourite that everyone will enjoy.

When I was little, my Mum used to bake date cookies. They were a real favourite – soft, chewy-crumbly and almost cakey, studded with chunks of toffee-ish dates. Delicious!

Cookie nostalgia

A few years ago, I was reminiscing about these cookies, and decided to bake some for Rosh Hashana – the Jewish new year – as dates are one of many symbolic foods for the festival.

I asked my Mum for her recipe. But I was devastated to learn that she had lost it! Her trusty recipe notebook, filled in by hand over years of cooking, had vanished without a trace.

Ever the fatalist, she had taken this loss in her stride, but I was gutted. I set about trying to recreate the date cookies from scratch, borrowing bits of recipes left, right and centre.

I ate a lot of sub-standard date cookies.

Date cookie recipe

Then, joy of joys! The notebook reappeared!

The first thing I did was to copy out the date cookie recipe. The second thing I did was to make a batch! The date cookies didn’t disappoint. I time-travelled back to my Mum’s kitchen, a child again. The taste was so evocative. 

Dutch Spices

Meanwhile, I’d received some information about speculaas spice – a traditional Dutch spice mixture containing cinnamon, cloves, ginger, and six other spices. It is traditionally used in the preparation of speculaas biscuits, a favourite snack of Dutch children. 

In a moment of wild abandon, I decided to add some speculaas spice mix to my date cookie mixture, instead of the usual vanilla. 

Spiced date cookies

The results? Delicious!

The familiar soft texture was unchanged, but the spices added a subtle warmth that went very well with the dates. One of my tasters ‘complained’ that she needed a mug of tea and a roaring fire to go with her date cookies. A bit unlikely for June, and to be fair, these kinds of gingerbread spices are probably more common in the UK in the winter months. But then, they eat them in the Caribbean year round, and it’s pretty hot there. So make these date cookies whenever you like!

Date cookies – ingredients

These date cookies use pretty standard pantry ingredients. The only thing you might not already have is the speculaas spice, but you can substitute any sweet spice mix for a similar effect, or leave it out altogether.

To make these yummy cookies, you will need:

• Dates – obviously! I recommend buying chopped stoned dates, otherwise you will have to spend ages stoning and chopping them yourself, which is fiddly and tedious.
• Butter or margarine – butter tastes better, marg is parve, take your pick.
• Light muscovado sugar – this is a soft light brown sugar that gives a wonderful flavour to the date cookies.
• Egg
• Self-raising flour
• Bicarbonate of soda
• Speculaas spice mix – or use mixed spice, pumpkin pie spice, cinnamon etc, or just leave it out. The original recipe from my Mum used vanilla instead – see the notes in the recipe card below.

A terrific tea time treat

I’m so glad I can enjoy my Mum’s delicious date cookies whenever I want to! And now you can join me – yay!

This recipe makes 34 spiced date cookies.

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📖 Recipe

Spiced date cookies

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Soft and crumbly, studded with succulent dates and flavoured with warming spices. These spiced date cookies are a childhood favourite that everyone will enjoy.

4.67 from 3 votes

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Prep Time 20 minutes mins

Cook Time 10 minutes mins

Total Time 30 minutes mins

Course Cookie

Cuisine American, Jewish

Servings 34 cookies

Calories 89 kcal

Ingredients

 

US CustomaryMetric

 

1x2x3x

• 155 g margarine or butter
• 100 g light muscovado sugar (or similar light brown soft sugar)
• 1 egg
• 1 level teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
• 1 teaspoon speculaas spice mix (or your favourite sweet spice mix)
• 255 g self-raising flour
• 200 g chopped stoned dates

Instructions

 

• Preheat the oven to 165°C (330°F). Line at least one baking sheet with parchment.
• Cream the margarine and sugar till fluffy. Add the egg, bicarb and spice and mix well.
• Add about a third of the flour, and a third of the dates, and mix well. Add another third of each, and mix. Add the final third of the flour and dates, and combine everything thoroughly to give a stiff dough.
• Allow the dough to stand for 5-10 minutes to firm up slightly.
• Take walnut-sized blobs of the dough, roll into balls, and flatten into discs. Place on a baking sheet and bake at 165°C (330°F) for around 10 minutes until golden. They will spread slightly in the oven, so leave some space between them.
• Allow to cool for a minute or two on the baking sheet before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.

Notes

You can use any sweet spice mix in place of the speculaas in this recipe, for instance mixed spice, pumpkin pie spice, or hawaij l’cafe.

To make my Mum’s ‘traditional’ recipe for date cookies, omit the speculaas spice mix and add half a teaspoon of vanilla essence instead.

Nutrition

Nutrition Facts

Spiced date cookies

Serving Size

 

1 cookie

Amount per Serving

Calories

89

% Daily Value*

Fat

 

4

g

6

%

Saturated Fat

 

2

g

13

%

Trans Fat

 

1

g

Polyunsaturated Fat

 

1

g

Monounsaturated Fat

 

1

g

Cholesterol

 

15

mg

5

%

Sodium

 

35

mg

2

%

Potassium

 

53

mg

2

%

Carbohydrates

 

13

g

4

%

Fiber

 

1

g

4

%

Sugar

 

7

g

8

%

Protein

 

1

g

2

%

Vitamin A

 

122

IU

2

%

Vitamin C

 

1

mg

1

%

Calcium

 

8

mg

1

%

Iron

 

1

mg

6

%

* Percent Daily Values are based on a 2000 calorie diet.

Keyword baking, dates, spice

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More delicious cookie recipes

If you love cookies, you might also enjoy these delicious apple and honey cookies, these wonderful ginger spice cookies, these fabulous inside-out cheesecake cookies, and these yummy coconut cranberry oatmeal cookies.

Treat Petite is organised by The Baking Explorer and Cakeyboi, who is also hosting this month. I’m also entering this recipe into Bake Fest, an event for vegetarian baked goods. Yum!

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